August Exercise Challenge...Everyone Welcome!

Any ideas or experience with these types of situations? we live in a rural area that honestly feels very safe, but I realized today that alone on those long, country dirt roads, I still really need to be able to take care of myself. I'm not interested in a gun for many reasons.

Good luck and have fun!!

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Honestly I think I would go one step further and contact the police. You never know if he's been building up his nerve to actually accost someone... So maybe other people in the area have reported similar run ins. Either way you might be surprised at how far the police will go and it might deter him from doing this sort of thing again if they look up his info and pay him a visit. I watched a mother jerk her little three year old around a store once so roughly I literally waited for them to leave to get her car information. It bothered me that she was willing to do that in public what would she do behind closed doors. I did report it and apparently they did pay her a visit.

At least the police could tell you if the guy has a record or something to that effect so you know whether or not this is a real nutcase or if he was just having a bad day and taking it out on you. It would certainly put me at ease on the next long run. Perhaps the police can also offer you suggestions on what to do if it happens again.

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Definitely call the police. I just had a running safety class and the teacher strongly recommended not carrying mace because it is used more often on the victim instead of your aggressor. Also, be sure to vary your running route, never run the same route and the same time every day.

Definitely call the police. I just had a running safety class and the teacher strongly recommended not carrying mace because it is used more often on the victim instead of your aggressor. Also, be sure to vary your running route, never run the same route and the same time every day.

So, I had a very scary run - It was my long run this week, and towards the end I had a big hill to go up. A man driving turned into a McD's entrance in front of me. What was scary was the way he was glaring at me. GLARING, not even just staring. It was very obvious, he slowed down enough for me to see his face clearly even in the car. No apparent reason that I could have done anything to piss him off. "Whatever," I thought, and kept running.

15 mins later, I had crested the hill and was turning left at a T intersection. I saw the guy again - and again, he slowed down, glaring at me. I looked right at him and threw my hands up like I was saying "what??" but he just kept glaring. Weird, right? He passed me and turned down a road that leads only to a camp ground and a cemetery, so I thought, "Good, he's going away." I immediately turned around.

Nope. What do you know, I saw him again. He had turned around on the cemetery road. Again, he glared at me from his car passing me, going in the same direction I was. I watched him pull ahead of me about a half mile, turn into a church parking lot (at 8am on Saturday morning?), park, and watch me run. Yeah, NO. Now I was worried.

I stopped short and put my hands on my hips, staring back at him, so he knew that I knew what was going on. He got out of the car and continued to look at me. I got out my cell phone and called my husband and said very loudly, "There is a creepy guy following me in a (described car) so I am going to get his license plate number and then come home." My husband is not easily spooked but he said immediately, "I'm coming to get you." Well, the guy then walked away from his car, heading out of the parking lot towards nothing in particular. So I got his plate number and car make. Didn't see him after that. Then my husband arrived and we went home. Forty minutes later I looked and the car was gone.

I was thankfully composed enough to do something in the moment, but I was still very spooked and if he had run at me, after running for over an hour already there was NO way I was going to outrun or overpower him. My question to you ladies is, what else could I have done/can I do in the future?

I run with my phone on long runs,
always give my route to my husband and an ETA for getting home.
I wear an ID bracelet that doesn't have my home address printed on it, you have to call a phone number and identify yourself as an EMT/etc.

I'm thinking of carrying mace but I am not confident I can deploy it (at the correct person anyway ) with sweaty fingers.

Any ideas or experience with these types of situations? we live in a rural area that honestly feels very safe, but I realized today that alone on those long, country dirt roads, I still really need to be able to take care of myself. I'm not interested in a gun for many reasons.

Good luck and have fun!!

Click to expand...

Having worked as a cilivian in law enforcement for 11 years, I can tell you, you did everything right. More often that not, just showing the aggressor that you're not intimidated by them (even if you are!) is a good thing. They end up believing you're too much hassle. Carrying spray can be a good thing, but as someone else mentioned, more often than not, it ends up being used on the victim, as they get too nervous to either deploy it correctly or it gets taken from them. I'm my own worst enemy as I don't carry my phone nor do I always tell the DH where I'm going, as I often don't decide until I get out there. Keep your phone on you, make a scene if you have to, and even though it's been a few days, go ahead and contact the police. They can at least make contact with the guy if the tag comes back to anything, and see what his story is. An unexpected visit from the PD may be enough to keep the idiot from messing with anybody else again.

8/31 - 60 minute run finished up the month with 914/1100. Fell short, but won't be the case in September! See you all next month!